Chris Christie

He’s changed his tune. I’m never going to change my tune.

Christopher James "Chris" Christie (born September 6, 1962) is an American politician, political commentator, lobbyist and former federal prosecutor who served as the 55th governor of New Jersey from 2010 to 2018.

Christie ran in the Republican Party primaries for the 2016 United States presidential election, but withdrew after a poor showing and endorsed Donald Trump. He later became a critic of Trump after the 2021 United States Capitol attack, and is running against him again in the Republican primaries for the 2024 United States presidential election.

Quotes

• After watching and listening to Judge Sotomayor's performance at the confirmation hearings this week, I am confident that she is qualified for the position of Associate Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court. Elections have consequences. One of those consequences are judicial appointments. While Judge Sotomayor would not have been my choice, President Obama has used his opportunity to fill a seat on the Supreme Court by choosing a nominee who has more than proven her capability, competence and ability. I support her appointment to the Supreme Court and urge the Senate to keep politics out of the process and confirm her nomination. Qualified appointees should be confirmed and deserve bi-partisan support. Chief Justice Roberts and Justice Alito deserved that support based on their work as Circuit Court Judges. So does Judge Sotomayor. As a result, I support her confirmation. This is a historic moment and her inspiring success story should not only make the Latino community proud, but all Americans.
  • Christie backs Sotomayor for Supreme Court, Politico (17 July 2009).

• I stood on the stage and watched Marco in rather indignantly, look at Governor Bush and say, someone told you that because we’re running for the same office, that criticizing me will get you to that office. It appears that the same someone who has been whispering in old Marco’s ear too. So the indignation that you carry on, some of the stuff, you have to also own then. So let’s set the facts straight. First of all, I didn’t support Sonia Sotomayor. Secondly, I never wrote a check to Planned Parenthood. Third, if you look at my record as governor of New Jersey, I have vetoed a 50-caliber rifle ban. I have vetoed a reduction this clip size. I vetoed a statewide I.D. system for gun owners and I pardoned, six out-of-state folks who came through our state and were arrested for owning a gun legally in another state so they never have to face charges. And on Common Core, Common Core has been eliminated in New Jersey. So listen, this is the difference between being a governor and a senator. See when you’re a senator, what you get to do is just talk and talk and talk. And you talk so much that nobody can ever keep up with what you’re saying is accurate or not. When you’re a governor, you’re held accountable for everything you do. And the people of New Jersey, I’ve seen it. And the last piece is this. I like Marco too, and two years ago, he called me a conservative reformer that New Jersey needed. That was before he was running against me. Now that he is, he’s changed his tune. I’m never going to change my tune. I like Marco Rubio. He’s a good guy, a smart guy, and he would be a heck of a lot better president than Hillary Rodham Clinton would ever be.
  • Full Transcript of the Sixth Republican Debate in Charleston, Time (14 January 2016).

• I believed that when I entered the White House grounds, that I had entered a safe zone, due to the testing that and I and many others underwent every day,I was wrong
• After a weeklong stay in a hospital icu due to COVID according to Christie says he was wrong not to wear mask in White House

• He was just beside himself. All he could think about was the campaign. He didn’t talk much about anything else. COVID would come into it, but really his focus was on the campaign.”
  • Lawsuit Threats, Empty Seats, and a “COVID Mobile”: Trump’s Disastrous Tulsa Rally Was Even More of a Train Wreck Than Originally Thought(November 11, 2021)

Republican Presidential Debate in Milwaukee, Wisconsin (23 August 2023)

Transcript by Roll Call (23 August 2023)

• Well, look, I do agree predominantly with what Governor DeSantis just laid out. I think that if you asked every one of us up here that we would agree predominantly with what he just laid out. Here is the difference. The difference is that we're going to have to work and make sure that we sell these ideas. And we able -- be able to put ourselves in a position where we get a majority of the vote, not only by winning the Congress and the Senate in '24, but also by having someone who has had the experience of doing it. Now I was elected as a conservative Republican in a blue state with 61 percent of the vote, with a Democratic legislature against me the entire time. And we still, through hard, strong decision-making, brought them around to our point of view. We cut taxes in New Jersey. We cut debt in New Jersey. We made sure that each and every time we were confronted with bad Democratic ideas we stood and stopped them. And when there were good ideas, we brought people together to make progress going forward. Truth and accountability are the things we need to do to fight waste. And I'd say the last thing is this, Bret. We cannot sit by any longer and allow the kind of spending that is going on in Washington. Because every dollar they spend is a dollar that these people are not allowed to spend on their children and their grandchildren. It's robbing our country and it's wrong.
• CHRISTIE: I've had enough -- I've had enough already tonight of a guy who sounds like ChatGPT standing up here. And the last person in one of these debates, Bret, who stood in the middle of the stage and said, "what's a skinny guy with an odd last name doing up here" was Barack Obama. And I'm afraid we're dealing with the same type of amateur standing on the stage tonight.

RAMASWAMY: Give me a hug -- give me a hug just like you did to Obama.

CHRISTIE: The same type of amateur.

RAMASWAMY: And you will help elect me just like you did Obama, too. Give me that big (ph) hug, brother.

CHRISTIE: The same type of amateur.

• You know, I'm proud of the fact, Bret, that I'm the only person along with Governor Hutchinson up on this stage who has actually run a United States Attorney's Office. I ran the fifth largest office in America, in a -- in a state where there is significant urban crime. And the problem is not going to be solved by more money. The problem is that these prosecutors in these localities, in the states, are refusing to do their job, and to arrest violent criminals. So, what a President Christie would do is appoint an Attorney General who would instruct each of the 93 US attorneys that they are to take over the prosecution of violent crime in every one of those cities that are failing to do so. We have plenty of room in the federal prisons to lock up these violent criminals and clean up what's going on all across this country in these individual cities. Secondly, what we need to make sure that each and every one of these criminals understand is that the laws apply to everybody, and when Hunter Biden fills out a fake application, a false application, for a gun permit, and then is facing a 10-year mandatory minimum, which was mandated by legislation sponsored by his father, and then you have a Justice Department that walks away from those charges. We're telling people that the law doesn't apply to everybody. In a Christie administration, he would go to jail for 10 years.
• Here's the -- here's the bottom line. Someone's got to stop normalizing this conduct. OK? Now -- and now, whether or not -- whether or not you believe that the criminal charges are right or wrong, the conduct is beneath the office of President of the United States. And, you know, this is the great thing about this country. Booing is allowed, but it doesn't change the truth. It doesn't change the truth.
• CHRISTIE: You -- you sit here talking about how you want to stand up for the rule of law...

RAMASWAMY: Yes.

CHRISTIE: ... and law and order. And the fact is that it can't be selective. In your book, you had much different things to say about Donald Trump than you're saying here tonight.

RAMASWAMY: That's not true.

CHRISTIE: Oh, it is very true.

RAMASWAMY: That is not true.

CHRISTIE: It's very true. I read it. And I know...

RAMASWAMY: Because there's a difference between bad behavior and illegal behavior, Chris.

CHRISTIE: Look, I -- no, no. By the way, by the way...

RAMASWAMY: And you, as a prosecutor, should know better.

CHRISTIE: Yes, yes, I -- you know what? I know a lot better.

RAMASWAMY: There's a difference between that and behavior. And...

CHRISTIE: I know. I know a lot better than you do. You have never done it, like you have never done anything to try to advance the interests of this government, except to put yourself forward as a candidate tonight. And here's the thing. We have stood up for law and order. I did it as US attorney. I did it as governor. And I am not going to bow to anyone when we have a president of the United States who disrespects the Constitution.

• All right, I'd like to answer the question you asked and not give a pre canned speech. Mike Pence stood for the Constitution. And he deserves not grudging credit. He deserves our thanks as Americans for putting his oath of office and the Constitution of the United States before personal political and unfair pressure. And the argument that we need to have in this party, before we can move on to the issues that Ron talked about, is we have to dispense with the person who said that we need to suspend the Constitution to put forward his political career. Mike Pence said no, and he deserves credit for it. OK.
• All right, look, I did go to Ukraine. And I went to Ukraine, because I wanted to see for myself, what Vladimir Putin's army was doing to the free Ukrainian people. And let me tell you, I want you all to look around this arena tonight. And imagine that every one of these seats was filled. And if every one of them was filled, there would still be 2500 more children outside to make over 20,000 who have been abducted, stolen, ripped from their mothers and fathers and brought back to Russia to be programmed to fight their own families. They have gouged out people's eyes, cut off their ears and shot people in the back of the head, men, and then gone into those homes and raped the -- the daughters and the wives who were left as widows and orphans. This is -- this is the Vladimir Putin -- this is the Vladimir Putin, who Donald Trump called brilliant and a genius. If we don't stand up against this type of autocratic killing in the world, we will be next.
• Look, Martha, the first thing we need to do is to stop any more from coming. That's the first thing we need to do. Then, the next thing we need to do with the folks that are here is to, again, as we've talked about all night, tonight, we have to have one order in this country, we have to enforce the law. And what that means is to make sure that people who come here illegally are not rewarded for being here illegally. We have so many wonderful people from around the world, who are waiting in line following the law to try to come here and pursue the American dream. And those people are waiting and waiting and waiting. Because we haven't dealt with the problem of the folks who are here. We have to have them detained. We have to make sure that they are not rewarded for having broken the law. And one last thing on this fentanyl issue, with China, we can't take our eye off of that ball. Yes, it's important that we secure the border, very important as I just said, but China is sending these chemicals to these drug cartels for them to create the fentanyl that is killing hundreds of thousands of our citizens. The Chinese are engaging in an act of war against us killing our citizens. We better make that priority one in our conversations with China and to try to straighten that relationship out because if we don't, we're going to lose more and more of our citizens.
• Look, of course -- the job of the president of the United States is to level with the American people about everything. The job of the president of the United States is to stand for truth. The job of the president of the United States is to be a role model for our children and our grandchildren. And so, whether it was UFOs or this problem of education, and Tim's right, by the way, and I started this in 2010 by going right after the teachers unions in New Jersey and drove them down to an all-time low popularity rating because they're putting themselves before our kids. That is our biggest threat to our country, not UFOs.
• Look, everybody on this stage wants to be the next president of the United States. And the only way that's going to happen is if we beat Joe Biden. I'm the only one on this stage who has every beaten a Democratic incumbent in an election. I did it in a deep blue state being outspent three to one. Beating a Democratic incumbent is not easy. The last Democratic incumbent president who was defeated was Jimmy Carter. And he was defeated by a conservative governor from a blue state who knew how to get results, who stood for the truth, who cared about accountability, and stood strong and hard against waste. Those are the very things that I did in my eight years as governor of New Jersey. And it's exactly what I'll do as president of the United States. Believe me, the Democrats want some other nominee who has never beaten a Democratic incumbent. I'm the one who can win this race. And if you give me the chance, I will restore our country by winning it.

About Chris Christie

• His were the eyes of a man who has gazed into the abyss, and the abyss gazed back, and then he endorsed the abyss.
  It was not a thousand-yard stare. That would understate the vast and impenetrable distance it encompassed.
  • Alexandra Petri (2 March 2016), "Chris Christie's wordless screaming", The Washington Post, retrieved on 2016-03-04